American Dreams

Wicked Pictures

Genre: Vignette

Director: Michael Raven

Cast: Alexis Duval, Kurt Lockwood, Julia Ann, Trevor Zen, Katsumi, Kris Slater, Katja Kassin, Melissa Lauren, Randy Spears, Steven St. Croix, Dani Woodward, Stormy Daniels, Lexi Marie, Austin Kincaid

Length: 79.5 minutes

Date of Production: 11/12/2004

Extra's: The best extra for many of you will be the bonus scene from Pin Ups between Julia Ann and Randy Spears. I described it below but it was well made in most ways. Personally, I enjoyed the 21.5 minute long Behind the Scenes feature by Mark Stone more (it had some good sex and interesting comments by the performers) as it was made for this movie. The next extra was a short, 2.5 minute long, montage of the gals posing followed by a 4.5 minute long box cover shoot. There were also trailers, various photogalleries, star stats, promotional materials a DVD catalog, DVD Rom materials, and a double sided DVD cover.

Condoms: Yes

Audio/Video Quality: American Dreams was presented in non-anamorphic widescreen color with an approximate aspect ratio of 1.85:1 as originally shot by director Michael Raven for Wicked Pictures. Michael used various lighting effects to achieve his artistic vision. The colors were accurate, the grain was less than usual, and the composition of the shots tended to be quite favorable to the cast. There were no compression artifacts or video noise that I saw and the visuals seemed just fine overall. The audio was presented with a choice of either a 5.1 Dolby Digital Surround English or a 2.0 German track. I listened to the English track and while I didn't hear any appreciable separation on the audio, it was nicely put together otherwise. I got the impression that it was actually recorded in 2.0 but later remastered with a 5.1 signal given the lack of separation but I could be mistaken. My biggest complaint about the audio was the virtual lack of a vocal track which limited my perception of the heat between the players.

Body of Review: One of my long term favorite performers in porn has to be the lovely and talented Julia Ann. Now a contract performer for Wicked Pictures, she has graced the world of porn for over a decade but still manages to look great as she makes feature movies for the company; typically with her significant other, Michael Raven, directing. Their latest collaboration is American Dreams, a vignette oriented movie that showed freedom as a conceptual backdrop for the sex that took place. If you're not into concept films, you can feel safe that the sex was as expected, with a host of attractive gals doing lots of sexually twisted acts to get you off. If this is what you're looking for, read the following breakdown of the scenes by cast and action, noting that condoms were used but they weren't particularly obvious in most cases:

Scene One: Highway: Alexis Duval, a cute brunette walking along a deserted stretch of road in a mountainous area, walked up on Kurt Lockwood, who's truck had broken down. After giving her his best mack-daddy lines (that weren't heard here), the couple hit it off enough to start kissing and rubbing one another in the public view. They then gave one another oral in an energetic fashion before he took her from behind. They swapped positions a few times and the audio track switched out to allow some of their vocals to be heard over the music with the scene ending as he rubbed out a load onto her face. It wasn't a bad scene but it didn't live up to the potential of the two performers either.

Scene Two: Sunset Ride: Julia Ann, looking all gussied up in western wear, rode her horse in the deserted plains with her breasts nearly falling out as she bounced around in the saddle. A visually stunning scene, she looked great as the scenery complimented her nicely throughout and her partner here, Trevor Zen, hooked up with her once she got home. They then began some foreplay, kissing and massaging one another before each got (and received) some playful oral from the other. They screwed vaginally for a bit and it ended with a titty fuck rubbing out his load to her chest. I saw some nice chemistry in the scene and the energy levels weren't horribly low but it wasn't as solid as some of her other recent work.

Scene Three: Flag: Katsumi, wrapped up in an American flag, teased the camera for a moment or two before blowing Kris Slater; leaving the flag as a backdrop for their scene. He went right into boning her tight ass with her blowing him (ATM) after that. She then jerked out his load onto her face in this limited action sequence. She was energetic but the camera purposefully kept his face out of the shot and that limited the chemistry.

Scene Four: Home Movies: Katja Kassin, the anal superstar, Melissa Lauren, the French blonde gal, Randy Spears, and Steven St. Croix, were all up next in a scene designed to give the effect of a home movie reel from the 1940's or 50's (technically, it was in color but the aged appearance of the effects made it look even older then the 70's). Katja took care of Randy while Melissa did Steven at a family cookout in someone's backyard. There were some limited vocals but the sex itself was fairly limited to oral with straight and anal screwing in a few positions. I would've preferred less artistic vision here but fans will like that it ended with a couple of facials.

Scene Five: The Mechanic: Dani Woodward, dressed like a biker chick garage mechanic, met boy toy Kris Slater out in the back of her shop in this scene. After a warm greeting, she slobbed his knob with a measure of enthusiasm and he gave her a solid boning as a reward. It ended when she jerked him off to her mouth, and the impression I got was that they had some chemistry together.

Scene Six: Burn Baby Burn: Stormy Daniels, a very attractive hotty contract performer at Wicked Pictures, took on her older counterpart Julia Ann, in a scene designed to focus on the two as firefighters outside of a three alarm fire. Lesbian scenes are tricky to do right since all too often, the gals come across looking like they are gay for pay but I got the sense that they truly enjoyed one another this time. There were no toys used this time, relying solely on tongues and fingers, with each gal giving as well as she received. They might not have been as energetic as possible but I'd have licked the mattress clean afterwards.

Scene Seven: Junkyard: Lexi Marie, the brand new Vivid contract performer with blondish hair, and brunette Austin Kincaid, were up last in another lesbian scene by a wasteland junkyard. The gals were looking fine in their short skirt and skimpy dress although I give Lexi credit for having the better body of the two (I loved that ass). This was another licking and finger sticking adventure that went along smoothly but had an appeal to a more limited audience since it was short and had little more than basic chemistry.

Bonus Scene: Pin Ups:"Julia Ann, the attractive contract star, starred in this scene with Randy Spears. She was dressed up like a Hollywood starlet from years ago and he was her chauffeur. He went down on her, she playfully teased him a bit before returning the oral favor, and then the two screwed on the old car before she jerked him off to completion. It had a lot of slow motion effects but looked pretty good."

Summary: American Dreams was too short for me to truly appreciate as much as I'd have liked to but it had enough value adding bonus footage to stoke my fire a bit more than anticipated. The cast was very attractive, the technical values solid (if bothersome at times), and couples looking for something that both partners can enjoy without getting too extreme will probably find this worth more than my rating of Rent It. Director Raven seems to hold fast to one style these days and while it sometimes works better than others, not everyone will appreciate his method of artistically approaching a porno like this one.

For better choices in porn, check out: 2004's Top Porn List and 2003's Top Porn List.